Imagine That

We just wrote about attempting to comprehend huge figures like 1,000,000,000 (one billion). Even one million is difficult to comprehend. Now, having said this, let me suggest a senior moment which isn't really a senior moment (it can happen to anyone, any age).

This moment is another comprehension moment. If you never have these moments, you are in a class of your own. To be envied or pitied is the question and only you can answer that. When I read a report on the sports page in our local newspaper that the average salary of the major league baseball player is about $2,700,000 (million, not billion, folks), my gut feeling was imagine that. Not to shabby for playing ball.

My senior moment kicked in again as I began to comprehend what was happening. I then began to wonder how it would feel to be a $350,000 player playing regularly alongside some multi-millionaires and wondered if there were any inklings of jealousy or resentment that might affect their play. Again, I found it difficult to comprehend as I silently breathed imagine that. Then I wondered how managers (the boss) might feel criticizing a player who earns (or gets paid anyway) several times as much as he does.

This senior moment never quite goes away. No matter who we are or what we have accomplished, someone out there usually outdistances us. If I sell a million books, someone else sells 2,000,000. If I get a perfect score on my SAT, some other student has done it more than once. If I invent a perfect part for a brand new engine, someone else has a dozen patents. If I relocate in my old age in the ideal, perfect retirement community, I soon hear of another place that has better weather, lower costs and better facilities.

And so I wish I could only say imagine that. But the truth is more disturbing because I am finding it more and more difficult to really say imagine that. For awhile I could say it quite easily, even convincingly, as if it didn't matter. What difference is it if someone makes more money than I do, or scores higher on an exam, or has more patents or lives in utter luxury? The truth is I do care even though I tell myself I don't really care.

This kind of a senior moment, the inability to be content with our lot whatever it may be, does sneak up on us, often beguiling us to think negative thoughts, to deprecate others needlessly, to eventually disfavor ourselves. This can happen if we let it.

We are now at the bottom of the page. Imagine that. For a moment, maybe, just maybe, we could adopt the expression imagine that  to replace what could be negative, demeaning, counter-productive or unworthy reactions to the myriad of moments that cross our paths. St. Paul had a great idea when he said that he would strive to be content in whatever state (condition) he was in and pushed it even further when he said in effect that a charitable person does not harbor a ledger of misdeeds or misgivings.

Imagine that. Being charitable isn't all bad.